Nov 26 (Reuters) - The 28-point peace plan to end the war in Ukraine, backed by the United States and made public last week, was based on a document written by Russia and submitted to the Trump administration in October, according to three sources familiar with the matter.
Sources say the Russians shared the document - which outlined Moscow's conditions for ending the war - with senior US officials in mid-October, following a meeting between US President Donald Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy in Washington.
The document, an unofficial communication known in diplomatic parlance as a "non-paper," contained formulations that the Russian government had previously presented at the negotiating table, including concessions that Ukraine had rejected, such as the surrender of a large part of territory in the east.
This is the first confirmation that the document – whose existence was first reported by Reuters in October – was a key component in the 28-point peace plan.
The US State Department and the Russian and Ukrainian embassies in Washington did not respond to requests for comment.
The White House did not comment directly on the "non-paper", but cited Trump's statements that he was optimistic about the progress of the 28-point plan.
"In hopes of finalizing this Peace Plan, I have directed my Special Envoy, Steve Witkoff, to meet with President Putin in Moscow and, at the same time, Secretary of the Army Dan Driscoll will meet with the Ukrainians," Trump wrote.
It is not clear why or how the Trump administration ended up relying on the Russian document to help craft its own peace plan. Several senior U.S. officials who reviewed it, including Secretary of State Marco Rubio, believed Moscow's demands would be immediately rejected by the Ukrainians, the sources said.
Skepticism about Russian influence
After delivering the document, Rubio held a telephone conversation with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, during which the material was discussed, the sources said.
Speaking to reporters in Geneva this week, Rubio admitted that he had received "a lot of written non-papers and things of that nature," without providing further details.
Since the peace plan was first reported by Axios last week, skepticism has grown among American officials and lawmakers, many of whom see the plan as a list of Russian positions rather than a serious proposal.
The United States has put pressure on Ukraine, however, warning that it may limit military aid if Ukraine does not sign.
The plan was drawn up at least in part during a meeting between Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner, special envoy Steve Witkoff and Kirill Dmitriev, the head of one of Russia's sovereign wealth funds, in Miami last month. Few people inside the State Department and the White House were briefed on the meeting, two sources told Reuters.
On Tuesday, Bloomberg reported that Witkoff had been advising senior Kremlin aide Yuri Ushakov on how Putin should speak to Trump. According to transcripts of the calls obtained by the news agency, Ushakov and Witkoff had mentioned a possible “20-point” plan as early as Oct. 14. The scope of the plan appeared to expand during subsequent talks with Dmitriev, the report said.
Revised plan following global backlash
The US proposal, which surprised officials in Washington and Europe, sparked a wave of diplomacy across three continents. The original plan has since changed significantly: nine of the original 28 points have been dropped after discussions between senior US and Ukrainian officials, according to ABC News.
A bipartisan group of U.S. senators said Saturday that Rubio had told them the 28-point plan was not a U.S. plan but a Russian wish list, although the White House and State Department strongly denied that Rubio had characterized it that way.
In the discussions that followed, a senior American delegation that included Rubio agreed to remove or modify some of the most pro-Russian points during meetings in Geneva with European and Ukrainian officials.
Driscoll is currently holding meetings with a Russian delegation in Abu Dhabi. A Ukrainian delegation is also in the United Arab Emirates for talks with the American team, according to a U.S. official.
On Tuesday, Ukrainian officials said they support the modified framework of the peace agreement that has emerged from recent talks, but stressed that the most sensitive issues - particularly territorial concessions - should be resolved in a possible meeting between Zelenskiy and Trump.
